Local car manufacturing company involved in this cars sale scandal.
The Manager of a local (national) car manufacturing company has been remanded for six days as graft investigators probe allegations that he accepted bribes amounting to several hundred thousand ringgit for selling company owned vehicles for cheap to a friendly party.
Both the Star and NST newspapers reported this in the last 24 hours.
The suspect’s remand order took effect from Tuesday (Sept 21, 2021) after Magistrate Shah Wira Abdul Halim allowed an application by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) that was submitted in court.
According to internal company sources, the general manager of the national car brand is being investigated for allegedly receiving money from a used car dealer in return for selling the cars at a low price.
It is learnt that the ‘bribe’ was because he had used his senior position in the national car company to help the used car dealer obtain the company cars at the very favorable price.
The cars were believed to have been sold at below market price and without following proper company procedure.
Sources said that initial investigation revealed that this activity started in 2019 and that the unapproved sales process had caused losses amounting to millions of ringgit through the sale of about 1,000 units of cars that had been sold at below market price.
It is learnt the cars involved were pre-production cars that were meant to be used at the manufacturing plant for the purposes of testing and quality control before the vehicle is actually manufactured for the market.
We have been involved in the automotive industry for more than two decades and we have never heard of the need to have 1,000 plus or so cars for rebadging purposes. A hundred or so cars make sense for product testing and localized parts sourcing, but 1,000 cars being used for this purpose should also be investigated by the national car company owners and directors as it seems that a lot of money and resources are being wasted for a rebadging exercise.
We are sure this arrest will open a new can of worms for this national car company and more unsavory ‘activities’ might surface.
We are also sure many more people are involved in this ‘game’ as it takes more than one senior employee or manager to move 1,000 vehicles undetected and without proper documents.
